SUBJECT:  EXTRACT FROM THE 100 HOUR GROUND WAR











                              Extract from 

                        The 100 Hour Ground War:

                        How the Iraqi Plan Failed



                              G2, VII Corps





~The decision, when and where to use chemical weapons, comes from the

highest level of the government.~



- Artillery Forward Observer,

    [b.6.] Mech Inf Div



.



~ Several senior Iraqi officers stated chemical munitions would not be used

against Coalition forces out of fear of large scale retaliatory strikes by

Coalition forces.88 Others believed that the Iraqis did not employ chemical

munitions because their own forces were severely under-equipped to survive

or operate in a chemical environment.89 Some sources argue that the Iraqi

artillery and indirect fire systems were so severely attrited by G-day that

they could not coordinate or come close to massing their artillery fire to

achieve any significant



8 7 Ibid .



88 op. cit., MSG, 202nd MI 8n, Joint Interrogation Facility-West ~JIF-W),

Subj: Artillery Training; Use of Chemical Rounds, cite ~0207-91, undated.

Iraqi division level artillery units are capable of delivering chemical

munitions. However, the commander has no authority to use them. Employment

of chemical munitions are monitored by an officer from the i~pecial

transportation unit.



89 Ibid. Several Iraqi PWs captured did not possess protective masks or any

type of chemical protective garments. Some Iraqi soldiers hid what little

food and/or personal belongings they had in their empty mask carriers.



_                               42



c~S ~





~Iraqi doctrine states that if a chemical round is received, it must be

fired that same day.~



- Staff officer,  [b.6.]    Inf Div



f . __ Iraq ' s non-use of chemicals . The Iraqis possess many chemical

delivery systems, including aircraft sprayers, bombs and missiles, multiple

rocket launchers, artillery (from 122mm and larger) and possibly mortars and

RPG-7 rockets. However, no chemical weapons were used in the KTO and no

chemical rounds were found in captured munitions stockpiles. There are

several possible explanations for this, the most likely being Baghdad's fear

of US and multinational Coalition forces retaliation for the use of the

chemical weapons. Interrogations of senior Iraqi officers revealed they

"...were unanimous in their assertion that there was no intent to employ

chemicals, and that there were no chemical munitions issued to their

divisions. Most believed that Saddam Hussein recognized that President Bush

would react in a manner unacceptable to Iraq if it employed chemicals. None

of the commanders expressed any misgivings about their inability to employ

chemicals; most regarded them as a bigger threat to (their own) poorly

equipped Iraqi soldiers.1'l22





~ The Iraqi commanders' fear for their own poorly equipped troops is well

founded. Many Iraqi soldiers only had masks, but no protective

overgarmentsl26 and there were complaints about the poor condition of

decontamination kits.127 Many mask filters hadn't been changed in years and

several units reported that their vehicles' chemical filtration systems were

broken.128

~ Some US and Allied intelligence officers speculate that even if the enemy

had chemicals and permission to use them, its lack of targeting intelligence

and its degraded fire control systems would have prevented the massing of

chemical fires on rapidly moving Coalition units.129







Regraded: Unclassified

Authority: DOD DS/DS Guidelines

By: ARCENT (3rd Army) G2

Date:  20 May 94